Studying Cultural Tourism in Trade Fairs

Territories in Question: Routes in Territories
By Saskia Cousin
English

On the basis of a survey carried out within the framework of a thesis work the author proposes a synthetic study of the Cultural Tourism Fair in France. The trade activity is remarkable first of all for the scarcity of monetary transactions. By contrast, the participants (visitors and exhibitors) aim at getting a maximum number of relational contacts. The fair is also a privileged place for the constitution of a professional community and of great importance for local politics, too. Lastly the fair space is saturated with pictures of touristic places. The author analyses these pictures as an idiom bearing a « performative utopia ». From the visitor point of view the Fair is a « non-place », from the exhibitors’ one it is a place of trade practices.

Keywords

  • Nantes
  • fair
  • cultural tourism
  • patrimony
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